Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood attacked over Welsh republican meeting

Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood has come under attack from political opponents after it emerged that last year she uttered a bizarre oath of allegiance to Welsh republicanism at a meeting in a Cardiff Bay wine bar.

Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood has come under attack from political opponents after it emerged that last year she uttered a bizarre oath of allegiance to Welsh republicanism at a meeting in a Cardiff Bay wine bar.

The meeting was also addressed by members of a radical Welsh nationalist group who expressed extreme anti-English views.

The group – Balchder Cymru (Pride of Wales) – regards two young men who blew themselves up on the eve of the Prince of Wales’ investiture in 1969 as martyrs.

Last night Plaid Cymru issued a statement dissociating the party from the “abhorrent” views of Balchder Cymru, saying Ms Wood and saying fellow Plaid AM Bethan Jenkins had attended the meeting “in good faith”.

The event took place in Mischiefs wine bar in June last year, on the same day the Queen opened the new session of the National Assembly.

Ms Wood and Ms Jenkins boycotted the event because they are republicans.

A video of the meeting was uploaded to YouTube only last week. It shows Ms Jenkins and then Ms Wood attesting an oath to Welsh republicanism, Ms Jenkins in Welsh and Ms Wood in English.

Ms Wood appears on the video saying, as she stands adjacent to a red, white and green Welsh republican flag: “We attest this flag is a symbol of Republican Wales. We will fight for the truth against the world. All nations are born of one people. All laws are born of one justice. All freedoms are born of one peace.”

She then says: “Is there peace?”, to which those present respond: “Peace”.

A member of Balchder Cymru is later seen on the 25 minute video engaging in a verbally aggressive anti-English rant during which he refers to Welsh “traitors”.

At one point he says: “There are members of the Free Wales Army in here, the workers army of the Welsh republic and other members in here that I can see but I can’t tell you who they are that have served time.

“Do you think we are arseing about down here? No.”

Members of the fringe and tiny paramilitary organisation the Free Wales Army were jailed for their activities in the 1960s.

Welsh Labour AM Ken Skates said: “I’m not a royalist, but it is frankly bizarre to see Leanne Wood swearing an oath of allegiance to this group and taking part in such a strange ceremony. Most worryingly of all it highlights a serious lack of political judgement on her part to share a stage with individuals who hold such extreme political views.

“Leanne Wood needs to decide whether she wants to spend her time in backstreet pubs pretending to be a radical political freedom fighter or take up the role she was elected to perform as the leader of a mainstream Welsh political party.

“Plaid Cymru and its leadership are at a crossroads: either they are a serious party focused on solving the big challenges we have to face in Wales or they are content to play gesture politics with radical fringe groups.”

A senior Welsh Conservative source said: “If a senior politician allows themselves to be in a small room with guest speakers who boast about violent and criminal separatist pasts, their judgement must be called into question.

“That this event was so small reinforces just how few people hold such views.

“Whatever her own thoughts on extremism, it’s clear from this video that independence and separatism are the main aims of Plaid’s leader, and always have been.”

Last night, after the Western Mail contacted Plaid Cymru but before this story was published, the video was taken down from the public section of YouTube.

A Plaid Cymru spokeswoman said: “Leanne and Bethan attended this event in good faith. Unfortunately a handful of individuals appear to have used the event to express views which we find abhorrent and from which we distance ourselves completely.”

Plaid also pointed out that its director of elections Ian Titherington had attended the same event, writing on his blog at the time: “There were poets, pints, politicians and pontificators and it was an interesting general debate on the differing versions of Republicanism that people had.

“I found some of the poetry particularly entertaining and was pleased to see several friends from Plaid and other parties there, but was a little depressed by a handful of individuals who took it upon themselves to use the event for an anti-English rant that sounded straight out of the 1960s. Surely we have moved on from blaming England for all our woes, especially now that we have a Parliament that we have responsibility for.”

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